Becky Mahoney wrote:
>
> I am thinking about a personalized plate too. I think it would be
> interesting to find out if any of the other listers have personalized
> plates, and if so, what do they say?
Personalised plates in the UK are a little bit tricky as the format is supposed
to adhere to one of the formats for standard plates e.g. LL nnnn (quite a lot
of MGs with MG nnnn) LLL nnn or nnn LLL or LLL nnn L or L nnn LLL where for a
long time one or two of the letters in the group of three indicated the place
of
registration. University Motors Group used to buy blocks of 'UMG'
registrations, and more recently there has been a spate of L nnn MGR, L nnn MGF
and 'M 6 lll' (MG LLL). You are not supposed to alter the spacing of letters
and
numbers to make 'words' more obvious, and because the single letter denotes the
12 month period of registration it is illegal for a car to carry a registration
where the single letter implies that the car is younger than it really is.
People also place black fixing screws in strategic positions so as to make '11'
look like a 'U', for example, and background-coloured screws through letters or
numbers e.g to make a 6 look like a G.
However the government auctions certain plates from time i.e. N 1 CKY
(UKP25,000
to you sir) which my daughter would have liked, and they sell series of less
desirable plates e.g. H 11 MPH and H 12 PBH (which can be read as "Hi I'm PH"
and
"Hi 2 PBH", how naff can you get) considerably cheaper. Therefore most, if not
all of their own plates really need 'illegal' spacing for best effect. A case
of
selling people their cake but not allowing them to eat it.
The single letter originally changed on the Jan 1st each year, but the snob
value
of a 'new letter' plus the increased monetary value at resale of a car
registered
on 1st Jan over one registered the previous day meant that huge numbers of cars
had to be stockpiled ready for 1st Jan. The letter change date was moved to
1st
August some time ago, but still leads to about 40% of cars being registered on
that day. Also, having already worked through the alphabet (not all letters
are
used) for the single letter at the end of the registration, and now shortly to
be
seeing 'S' registrations at the beginning of current registrations, we are
rapidly running out of numbers.
So the government has come up with a new format of LLL nn LL where the group of
three belongs to the car, the two digits represents some time period but I am
not
sure how it overcomes the '1st Aug rush', and the group of two letters
indicates
the place of registration again. Incorrect spacing, letter font, spurious
fixing
screws etc are all to become illegal and pundits reckon it is a blow to
personalised plates (and hence government income, one assumes) as well as (re)
introducing a new snob element of location.
Why the USA style isn't adopted I'll never know (apart from civil service
mentality) as a plate that makes a word is far mor memorable for witnesses of a
road incident, I would have thought. A chap I met in Nantucket has a Bugatti
look-alike with 'BUGATTI' at the back and 'DWAYNE' at the front, the one at the
back presumably being the registered number. He told me that he registered the
plate some years before he got the car on the road and had to pay to keep the
plate otherwise it would have been assigned to someone else.
For my part the roadster has a completely standard plate and although the V8
was
registered MGS 787 P from new they will always be 'Bee' and 'Vee' to me and
that
is what is displayed on the front plates under the official registration.
PaulH.
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